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This is probably the best "crisis communication" possible, the one that all communicators dream after the fire … Three months after the Cambridge Analytica case and two months after the entry into force of the European regulation on Data protection (RGPD), US tech giants continue, quarter after quarter, to post record results.
While calls for better regulation of digital heavyweights are increasing, including in the United States United, and that the controversies follow one another ("fake news", data manipulation …) the Gafam (Google, Amazon, Facebook, Apple, Microsoft) show an exemplary resistance, given the context.
All as the siphoning of data from at least 87 million Facebook users had not put the social network in the red in the spring, the fine of 4.3 billion euros imposed last week by Brussels to Google for abuse of dominance is far from putting the Californian giant on the ground.
On the contrary, Google continues to act as a real "steamroller". Tuesday, its parent company Alphabet has thwarted all predictions of badysts, publishing a turnover up more than 25% in the second quarter. Its best performance in four years.
War machine
" Such growth, on a base that already weighed several tens of billions, shows how Google is a machine of war, notes Thomas Husson, vice-president of the Forrester firm in Paris. The mechanics are very well oiled and running at full speed this quarter. »
Admittedly, the spectacular fine announced on 18 July by the European Commission is striking Google's net profit. It fell 9.3% to $ 3.2 billion. But its growth engine, namely the advertising broadcast on all its media (the search engine, Gmail, YouTube, Google Maps …) remains out of reach. With a 24% increase, advertising revenues still represent more than 86% of the group's revenues. Recently, Google has overhauled its advertising products, including Google AdWords, launched eighteen years ago.
" The digital ad is the DNA of Google, the heart of their model, summarizes Thomas Husson. But it's a world that is changing fast. Consumers no longer want to be saturated and demand transparency. Some advertisers, for their part, want alternatives to duopoly exerted by Google and Facebook .
Google and Facebook trust 56% of the advertising market
The two giants "trust" together 56% of the market Internet advertising, according to eMarketer. This sector is also jostled by the arrival of the RGPD, but again, Google resisted.
According to eMarketer, the Californian group should still control 31% of the market in 2018. Almost as much as last year. " It is still a little too early to measure the impact [du RGPD] because it is also a great upheaval for our partners ", said Google CEO Sundar Pichai on Tuesday. A telephone point with the badysts
In France, indeed, it is indeed the press editors and the advertisers who were the first affected, when Google came into compliance with the RGDP. Google's application of the European regulation to the letter had led to a fierce battle between the US search engine and five professional organizations in the sector.
Direction: The Cloud
But investors also expect Google to expand beyond advertising. For now, its activities in the cloud, the "hardware" and the autonomous car, via its subsidiary Waymo, represent only about 13% of the total and still show losses.
But in front of the Chinese giants who aim to more and more European cloud market, Google is obliged to accelerate it too in this area. Sundar Pichai also announced on Tuesday that he has won three new clients: Domino's Pizza, the SoundCloud music streaming platform and the PwC audit firm.
Raphaël Balenieri
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